“If I don’t support the politics of political clients, I don’t take the case,” he once said. A few weeks after September 11, he said, “If Osama bin Laden arrived in the United States today and asked me to represent him, sure I’d represent him.”

He points proudly to a recent picture of him sitting side by side with Sheik Ahmed Yassin, the Hamas spiritual leader who cheers on the shrapnel-laden Palestinian bombers from his wheelchair in Gaza.

“I’ve been arrested on a good number of occasions – it comes with the turf – both before being a lawyer and since being a lawyer. But, as we say, inshallah” – Allah willing – “my record is perfect.”

No more.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office alleges Cohen failed to file income taxes for six years from 2005-10, to report a cash payment of more than $10,000 and to maintain records or books of transactions.

And it's not the first time he pleaded guilty.

For the sake of argument – and Cohen’s life is all about argument – he will concede certain points. “I’m a pig. I’m a self-hating Jew. I’m a communist.”